Many storage systems regulate access to stored content by access control lists. Access control lists provide storage systems a mechanism for controlling access to content stored in the database. For example, in an object hierarchy, for example a tree of interconnected files and folders, each object within the hierarchy (e.g., each folder, file, etc.) has its own access control list stored with the particular object. Each access control lists for each object may be stored within object metadata for each object, or may be stored within the object itself.
In such an object hierarchy, a child object usually inherits the access control list of a parent object. Thus, any change to an access control list would require a change to each descendent access control list for each descendent object in the object hierarchy. Moreover, when a particular child object access control list is changed, the access control lists for its descendent objections must be changed, but the access control lists for its ascendant objection need not be changed.